Who I am today. Who I’ll be tomorrow.

These words come from the safety of a day when I know exactly who I am and what I stand for. Sometimes these days are rare and my entire existence is consumed by the question of what exactly it is I am doing. Sometimes my entire being seems to be split into fragments, which don’t get along and blatantly refuse to try. Who am I today? And who the truck will I be tomorrow?

Today I’m 100% sure and the two fighting Me’s within me agree on something.

Identity. 8 letters. Pronounced in a questioning tone. Often preceded by My. Frightfully irritating. Say for instance, you’ve gone speed dating. “Tell me about yourself,” The big-breasted-nurse-from-Gipsley opposite you asks. What do you answer? “Weeelllll I like walking my dog.” Gee, good start.

Then you decide to join an online networking community, (otherwise known as Facebook or MySpace) and the cheeky Internet-world demands you explain “About me”. Now be concise, and try and make it look like you didn’t spend hours deliberating. “Well I like walking my dog....”
You had me at well.

What is this thing we spend so much of our time asking ourselves about? Identity is the sum of its parts – likes, dislikes, religion, gender, ethnicity, sexuality, nationality, experiences, time, age, place, culture, friends, family, values, memories, appearance, genetics... And the list, oh how it goes on. It’s about who we identify with on a personal level, in our society and the world at large. In short, it’s who you are, according to you. But it’s dependant on factors like time, place and age, its fluidity is its very core. Its undefinability.

Pause! Undefinability? Lucky, that word doesn’t exist! Thank that nice rock of unchanging surety. We categorise, define and refine others, the world, the plants, stars, everything from shoes to the furthest layer of our knowledge. We categorise, define and refine ourselves. The world is ordered, classified and finally, understood. One does need something to cling to in this world. There is normal and weird, black and white, right and wrong. Hmm contentment. Until you open your eyes and actually see the world anyway.

Because however hard we try, this world wasn’t made to fit nicely into our boxes of understanding. Who I am, and who I’ll be tomorrow, my identity, it will keep changing. The world seems to want you to fit somewhere, the unspecified-they wants facts, statements, concrete Identity. Today I realised, and I mean really realised, what I have long held to be true - I refuse to fit into those boxes anyway. If I can’t be one or the other, I will embody the best of both. Because today I’m the girl wearing guy’s cargo’s and a cap, with a notebook in her pocket. Tomorrow I might be the girl wearing boots and a collared tee, munching on rocket. On Wednesday you’ll find me on a train somewhere, dressed in shades of grey. And maybe one day soon, I’ll come visit you with me, myself and I. I’m big and I’m small, my hair is neither orange nor red, I’m positive and a pessimist, I’m masculine and I’m feminine, I’m the same freckled face kid from yesteryear, and yet I’ve changed completely and maybe tomorrow, I’ll never be the same again.

That’s who I am. Thats just how it is. And its not an excuse. It’s a mission statement.


And I love walking my dog.